Production, packing, and related industries are highly reliant upon automated systems. Mass production, particularly, requires highly automated systems that are efficient and cost-effective. This is perhaps best actualized in terms of conveyor systems that transport, arrange, and otherwise direct a product being manufactured or altered in a mass production environment.
Conveyor systems are essential to move the product between numerous production stations. Often the stations are themselves automated so that the product must be constantly arranged on the conveyor in order for the production stations to properly engage the product. The flow of articles will typically need to be arranged in a number of rows or columns suitable for the specific production station that operates in conjunction with the conveyor system.
The reliance on the conveyor system is also a production liability. It is known that the conveyed product can become improperly arranged upon the conveyor system. The conveyor system might also upset, tip over, or otherwise displace the product to the point that the product blocks the remaining product flow. A company's margin is often dependent on a high production rate, which is in turn dependent on conveyor line speed, efficiency and utilization. As such, consistent or even intermittent stoppages in production that require human intervention can be a significant financial liability.
One particular problem area of existing conveyor systems is when columns of products exiting a multi-column production station must be consolidated into a lesser number of columns (or vice versa). The conveyor must include a product conveying apparatus that uninterruptedly consolidates a mass or multiple columns of a product so as to rearrange that mass or columns into a new, specific number of columns without any conveyor stops. On the other hand, it may be necessary to take a relatively low number of product columns moving at a high production rate and rearrange them to a larger number of outgoing columns. The production rate at each production station may be different. Increasing or decreasing the number of columns of product presented to each production station accounts for this variance in production capabilities between production stations.
An even more difficult production problem exists where the columns of products at any given point on the conveyor line comprise columns moving at different production speeds. In other words, in a four column system, it may happen that the product in columns 1 and 2 move more quickly than columns 3 and 4. The different production rates may only occur in one zone of the conveyor system. On the other hand, each production station may process each column at different speeds.
It is also known for one or more columns in a multi-column production station to malfunction so that production is stopped for that particular column(s). A product directing system will need to service the quicker moving columns more often than the slow moving production columns. Likewise, it is important for a product directing system to not direct products into a stopped production column until production in that column can be resumed. Nevertheless, existing product directing systems fail to adequately account for these occurrences.
A typical product directing system may include sidewalls bounding the conveyor wherein the sidewalls are angled inwardly to create an increasingly narrow travel path. Dividers can then be arranged to separate the constricted product flow into individual columns. The entry and exit points are largely fixed.
This approach, and other known methods, are highly disposed to upsetting (tipping over) the product, damaging the product, or otherwise jamming or blocking the conveyor system. Other known shortcomings exist. Accordingly, there is a need for a more stable and efficient conveyor directing system and method. The conveyor directing system would ideally act to support the product and would operate in an efficient, simple, and cost-effective manner. A product directing system and method in accordance with the present invention would effectively organize, sort, direct, or redirect an item on a conveyor system, as needed.